Silver-haired LegislatureSince 2010 Arkansas families have benefited from a program known as the Silver Alert. The Silver Alert is a public notification system to broadcast information about missing persons, especially senior citizens with Alzheimer’s disease, dementia or other mental disabilities in order to aid in their recovery. But what you may not realize is how this concept came to the attention of legislators. It was the direct result of senior citizens activel...

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State House of RepresentativesThe Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Thanks and givingThanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. A chance to be grateful instead of focusing on gift-giving and gift-receiving. Family, friends, bountiful feasts and football are at the forefront of our minds rather than cocktail parties and gifts. Think of it as a time to pause and give thanks before the whirlwind of December. Thanksgiving began in 1621. The pilgrims invited the Wampanoag Native Americans to join them in celebration of the fall h...

Home-grown survival kitCONWAY — Several months ago I presented a column titled “SHELTER BOX: A Truly Great Idea,” that set forth ideas for use in the event of manmade or natural disasters where large numbers of people are displaced for an extended period of time. The organization, based in the United Kingdom, had meticulously determined the most basic and pressing needs to include in a pre-packaged box for mass distribution. Well, one of my local readers, Delores Ca...

Racial quota punishmentIf anyone still has any doubt about the utter cynicism of the Obama administration, a recent agreement between the federal government and the Minneapolis Public Schools should open their eyes. Under the Obama administration, both the Department of Education and the Department of Justice have been leaning on public schools around the country to reduce what they call the “disproportionate” numbers of black male students who are punished for vari...

Teaching hateThe murder on Tuesday of five people and the serious wounding of several others while they were praying at a synagogue in Jerusalem is only the latest in a continuing pattern of violence and hatred directed against Israel and the Jewish people. It also replays a familiar scenario: terrorist act is followed by condemnation (though not as strong as when Israel is perceived to be responsible for Palestinian deaths), followed by threats of retalia...

A Legacy of LiberalismSupreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said there were “phrases that serve as an excuse for not thinking.” One of these phrases that substitute for thought today is one that depicts the current problems of blacks in America as “a legacy of slavery.” New York Times writer Nicholas Kristof asserts that there is “overwhelming evidence that centuries of racial subjugation still shape inequity in the 21st century” and he mentions “the lingerin...

GOP's timing was good ... this yearHere’s what did not happen on Election Day: The American people did not simply rise up and repudiate President Obama and give Republicans a mandate. Oh, they did repudiate Obama, but the Republican Party’s big win was more the result of timing and demographic factors that worked entirely in its favor this year and mostly will favor Democrats in 2016. We’re talking nationally, not about Arkansas. What happened in Arkansas was permanent. Let’s f...

Novel brings attention to sister's 1976 murder caseOne of the best things about being retired from full-time newspaper work is that I have time to read about something other than current events. I have made a small dent in my library and moved a few new books to the top of my reading list. One of the latter is “A Sunny Place for Shady People,” published this year by Stiletto Press. The author is Stephen W. Brooks, a fellow native of Hot Springs who lives on St. Simon’s Island, Ga. It’s his fif...

Beebe tries to leave mark with budgetLITTLE ROCK — Painting a bleak picture of the impact tax cuts already approved could have on state agencies, outgoing Gov. Mike Beebe wasn’t just trying to issue a warning to a Republican successor elected on a vow to slash income taxes. He’s also trying to leave his last mark on a state budget that he’s had a hand in crafting for more than three decades. The two-term Democratic governor’s lame-duck budget recommendations go before a Legislatu...

Two final budgetsLITTLE ROCK — During my last year in office, I have visited many annual events and celebrated many annual traditions with a sense of nostalgia. At each of these occasions, I was acutely aware that it was my last time there as governor. Last week brought my final visit to the legislature’s Joint Budget Committee. My history, in this case, far eclipses my time as governor. I was deeply involved in budget negotiations throughout my 20 years in th...

General revenue forecast more than $5 billionLITTLE ROCK — This year is one of those where we are set to review more than just one budget proposal. Arkansas law requires the governor to submit a balanced budget proposal to the General Assembly before every session. Our laws also allow for the governor-elect to review the budget and make his or her recommendations as well. Gov. Mike Beebe presented two budgets in presession budget hearings this week. Incoming Gov. Asa Hutchinson can also ...

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State House of RepresentativesThe Courier Your Messenger For The River Valley

Do you remember High-Tax Harry?CONWAY — Someone once said we should enjoy life now, because it has an expiration date. My father passed away in 1977 and was a veteran of World War I. Back in the 1950s when I was growing up, he often referred to former President Truman as “High-Tax Harry.” I know one thing, if he had lived longer he would take that back. Compared to what is happening with our nation’s finances today, most older Americans long for the days of Harry Truman. A ...

The audacity of arroganceIn the week following the shellacking of his party in the midterm elections, one might think that President Barack Obama would be conciliatory and humble. Instead, he has continued to be audacious — but with arrogance rather than hope. The day after the elections, during a White House news conference, Obama said this in response to a reporter’s questions about the possibility of changing focus based on the mid-term election results: “The key i...

What happened?Just what happened last week on election day? And what is going to happen in the years ahead? The most important thing that happened last week was that the country dodged a bullet. Had the Democrats retained control of the Senate, President Obama could have spent his last two years in office loading the federal judiciary with judges who share his contempt for the Constitution of the United States. Such judges would have been confirmed by Senat...

Who are you calling stupid?“Stupid is as stupid does.” — Forrest Gump Unless you regularly follow conservative media, you may not have heard what one of the architects of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) thinks about you. Jonathan Gruber is a Massachusetts Institute of Technology health economist who helped craft Obamacare. In a rare moment of unvarnished candor, Gruber told an audience last year at the University of Pennsylvania the law passed because of the “st...

Amendment could change political climateWhile covering a pre-election meeting of the Independence County Democratic Central Committee around 1980, I noticed that everyone there had gray hair or no hair. Looking for a fresh angle to the story, I asked the party chairman what a young person might do to get involved in the political process. We really don’t need anybody else, he said adamantly. Such was the attitude of party leaders in organizing volunteers and appointing poll workers....

What now for third parties, IndependentsIt was a great week for Republicans. It was a terrible week for Democrats. And for third party and independent candidates, it was mostly more of the same. I thought there might be a minor backlash against the U.S. Senate race’s negativity. Nope. Libertarian Nathan LaFrance and Green Mark Swaney each collected about 2 percent of the vote. Libertarians each won about 4 percent in the congressional races, except in the Third District, where Grant...

Midterm shows long-term shiftLITTLE ROCK — Angry with a president who will be out of office in a little over two years, voters resoundingly ended Arkansas’ tradition as a Democratic holdout in the South and handed Republicans control of the state. It’s a takeover that had been building over the past two elections, and rebounding from it will likely take much longer for a Democratic Party adjusting to its new role as a minority party. The Arkansas GOP by the end of the nig...

TransitionLITTLE ROCK — With the 2014 campaigns and elections now behind us, the focus of state government shifts to transition. I have begun meeting with Governor-elect Asa Hutchinson to talk about both the work of being governor and the operations of this office. The departments within my office have prepared transition documents to help the incoming administration prepare for the duties and services provided by this governor’s office. I anticipate th...

Rimland vs. heartland on Triple ContinentThe geographical concepts of heartland and rimland were developed by Halford Mackinder and Nicholas J. Spykman, respectively. Mackinder contended that the nation which controlled the inland portions of Africa, Asia and Europe could control the triple continent. In contrast, Spykman maintained that the nation or allied nations that held coastal-rim bases in Africa, Asia and Europe could control the triple continent. Historically, for about thre...